Posts
Monday, Jun. 13, 2011
Main Street homeless center opens today
But the real work begins Wednesday, when the first homeless clients arrive
Transitions, Main Street’s $15 million privately paid for homeless shelter, officially opens today after surviving three years of lawsuits, fundraising and politics.
It will have all the standard homeless services, including an emergency overnight shelter, counselors and a long-term program designed to find people jobs and a permanent place to stay.
But two services make Transitions unique to the Midlands: a day center and respite car
The day center will open first, officially accepting clients Wednesday. It’s a large room with a dining area, couches and computers. People can take showers, do laundry and get help with resumes or make appointments to see if they qualify for things like veterans or disability benefits.
“Or they can just hang out … out of the heat,” said Larry Arney, executive director of the Midlands Housing Alliance, the nonprofit organization of business, church and other community leaders that will operate Transitions.
Respite care will open sometime over the summer.
State law prevents hospitals from discharging patients if they don’t have a place to stay. So many patients who are homeless end up staying in the hospital, racking up $2,000 a day in charges the hospital has to absorb, according to Greg Gattman, vice president of operations for Palmetto Health.
Gattman said the hospital system has between 35 and 40 homeless patients every month it cannot discharge.
With respite care, Transitions will provide a place for these patients to be discharged, where they can be monitored by a nurse and reminded to take medications.
It will have all the standard homeless services, including an emergency overnight shelter, counselors and a long-term program designed to find people jobs and a permanent place to stay.
But two services make Transitions unique to the Midlands: a day center and respite car
The day center will open first, officially accepting clients Wednesday. It’s a large room with a dining area, couches and computers. People can take showers, do laundry and get help with resumes or make appointments to see if they qualify for things like veterans or disability benefits.
“Or they can just hang out … out of the heat,” said Larry Arney, executive director of the Midlands Housing Alliance, the nonprofit organization of business, church and other community leaders that will operate Transitions.
Respite care will open sometime over the summer.
State law prevents hospitals from discharging patients if they don’t have a place to stay. So many patients who are homeless end up staying in the hospital, racking up $2,000 a day in charges the hospital has to absorb, according to Greg Gattman, vice president of operations for Palmetto Health.
Gattman said the hospital system has between 35 and 40 homeless patients every month it cannot discharge.
With respite care, Transitions will provide a place for these patients to be discharged, where they can be monitored by a nurse and reminded to take medications.
Gattman said Transitions’ respite care will be the only one of its kind in the Midlands.
“Respite is a safe place to transition these patients, to let them continue to get their medical needs met on an outpatient basis and let them stay some place while they continue their recovery,” he said. “We can use that hospital bed for somebody who needs that acute care.”
Columbia has always had multiple organizations that give homeless people a place to sleep at night.
But the city hasn’t had a homeless day center in at least 10 years, when the Oliver Gospel Mission shut down its day center because “the place kind of turned into a flophouse,” said Wayne Fields, the mission’s executive director.
As a result, public libraries have become the de facto day center for Columbia’s homeless, including Bryant King, who visited the Richland County Public Library’s main branch on Assembly Street Monday afternoon to use the computer.
“If I can get a job and a motel room, that’s all I need,” he said. “I’ll take the simplest thing I can get.”
But some nearby neighborhood residents see the day center as a problem, not a solution.
The homeless can come and go as they please at the day center, a concern to some that it will turn their neighborhood streets into a homeless highway.
“As the person who runs the Neighborhood Watch in Elmwood Park, we have a lot of traffic and a lot of burglary problems. With the new homeless people coming, I can’t say that it is going to improve,” said Peter Korper, the former Elmwood Park neighborhood association president who filed a lawsuit to stop the alliance from building the homeless center. “It’s just in the wrong place. Other cities laugh at us. What are we doing putting a homeless center in the middle of the state capital?”
But the homeless center doesn’t appear to be hurting Main Street.
Mast General Store opened last month at Main and Taylor streets. Some Lowcountry developers have purchased and are refurbishing 1556 Main St., and some Myrtle Beach restaurateurs plan to open a Brazilian Steak House in the Kress Building, across from the Columbia Museum of Art.
Fred Martin, vice president of operations for Mast General Store, said the company’s Asheville store is surrounded by homeless service providers.
“In downtown urban settings, you have to provide service for all who live in the area, and homeless people do live in the urban area,” he said. “I think that everybody can get along together, and I think that’s the philosophy of Mast. We are a community together, and we have to help each other.”
Transitions was built largely with private dollars, but a portion of its operating expenses, estimated to be just over $2 million a year, will include some public money.
Columbia City Council gave the Midlands Housing Alliance $250,000 this budget year, and plans to give another $250,000 next budget year, which begins July 1. The alliance will use the money for security, including running criminal background checks.
“The building will open with no long-term debt, which we always said was really paramount to success because we don’t have a dedicated funding source,” Arney said. “We have been, I think, kind of remarkably successful in getting support out of local governments, which has been one of our big challenges in our campaign.”
Even more remarkable is that the alliance received money from Columbia City Council, which in 2008 tried to persuade the alliance to move its homeless shelter to some city-owned property by the river. The alliance rejected the offer, and in response the city declined to contribute to the building campaign.
In addition to Columbia, the Midlands Housing Alliance has received financial commitments from Richland and Lexington counties and the city of West Columbia. The alliance has asked Cayce City Council for money, but that has not been approved.
Arney said public money makes up about a third of the center’s annual operating budget.
Fields, director of the Oliver Gospel Mission, said Columbia’s homeless service community has embraced Transitions and hopes it succeeds.
But he noted Transitions is a new facility with a new staff that is about to discover the challenges of reaching the homeless.
“They have their operational challenges ahead of them. … You can have something really good that’s going on, but it can really get abused, and I think the staff there will, they will learn that,” Fields said. “We haven’t figured it all out. We’ve learned some things along the way. It’s a big pie, and there are some pieces they are going to address that we’re not. So we’re really thankful this thing is going to happen.”
“Respite is a safe place to transition these patients, to let them continue to get their medical needs met on an outpatient basis and let them stay some place while they continue their recovery,” he said. “We can use that hospital bed for somebody who needs that acute care.”
Columbia has always had multiple organizations that give homeless people a place to sleep at night.
But the city hasn’t had a homeless day center in at least 10 years, when the Oliver Gospel Mission shut down its day center because “the place kind of turned into a flophouse,” said Wayne Fields, the mission’s executive director.
As a result, public libraries have become the de facto day center for Columbia’s homeless, including Bryant King, who visited the Richland County Public Library’s main branch on Assembly Street Monday afternoon to use the computer.
“If I can get a job and a motel room, that’s all I need,” he said. “I’ll take the simplest thing I can get.”
But some nearby neighborhood residents see the day center as a problem, not a solution.
The homeless can come and go as they please at the day center, a concern to some that it will turn their neighborhood streets into a homeless highway.
“As the person who runs the Neighborhood Watch in Elmwood Park, we have a lot of traffic and a lot of burglary problems. With the new homeless people coming, I can’t say that it is going to improve,” said Peter Korper, the former Elmwood Park neighborhood association president who filed a lawsuit to stop the alliance from building the homeless center. “It’s just in the wrong place. Other cities laugh at us. What are we doing putting a homeless center in the middle of the state capital?”
But the homeless center doesn’t appear to be hurting Main Street.
Mast General Store opened last month at Main and Taylor streets. Some Lowcountry developers have purchased and are refurbishing 1556 Main St., and some Myrtle Beach restaurateurs plan to open a Brazilian Steak House in the Kress Building, across from the Columbia Museum of Art.
Fred Martin, vice president of operations for Mast General Store, said the company’s Asheville store is surrounded by homeless service providers.
“In downtown urban settings, you have to provide service for all who live in the area, and homeless people do live in the urban area,” he said. “I think that everybody can get along together, and I think that’s the philosophy of Mast. We are a community together, and we have to help each other.”
Transitions was built largely with private dollars, but a portion of its operating expenses, estimated to be just over $2 million a year, will include some public money.
Columbia City Council gave the Midlands Housing Alliance $250,000 this budget year, and plans to give another $250,000 next budget year, which begins July 1. The alliance will use the money for security, including running criminal background checks.
“The building will open with no long-term debt, which we always said was really paramount to success because we don’t have a dedicated funding source,” Arney said. “We have been, I think, kind of remarkably successful in getting support out of local governments, which has been one of our big challenges in our campaign.”
Even more remarkable is that the alliance received money from Columbia City Council, which in 2008 tried to persuade the alliance to move its homeless shelter to some city-owned property by the river. The alliance rejected the offer, and in response the city declined to contribute to the building campaign.
In addition to Columbia, the Midlands Housing Alliance has received financial commitments from Richland and Lexington counties and the city of West Columbia. The alliance has asked Cayce City Council for money, but that has not been approved.
Arney said public money makes up about a third of the center’s annual operating budget.
Fields, director of the Oliver Gospel Mission, said Columbia’s homeless service community has embraced Transitions and hopes it succeeds.
But he noted Transitions is a new facility with a new staff that is about to discover the challenges of reaching the homeless.
“They have their operational challenges ahead of them. … You can have something really good that’s going on, but it can really get abused, and I think the staff there will, they will learn that,” Fields said. “We haven’t figured it all out. We’ve learned some things along the way. It’s a big pie, and there are some pieces they are going to address that we’re not. So we’re really thankful this thing is going to happen.”
No comments:
Post a Comment